A new documentary with David Attenborough outlined some of the challenges we face in the coming decades unless (and in some cases even if) we change some of our current behaviour.
Geographers have been warning of many of these things for decades of course, but the message is slow to prompt individual change, and the systems in place make that difficult. Plus, the larger scale activities of countries to continue developing fossil fuels and not protect important habitats. The link between our exploitation of wild animals and the emergence of pandemics has already been explored as well.
More details of the programme from the iPlayer page where it can be viewed.
Extinction is now happening up to 100 times faster than the natural evolutionary rate, but the issue is about more than the loss of individual species. Everything in the natural world is connected in networks that support the whole of life on earth, including us, and we are losing many of the benefits that nature provides to us. The loss of insects is threatening the pollination of crops, while the loss of biodiversity in the soil also threatens plants growth. Plants underpin many of the things that we need, and yet one in four is now threatened with extinction.
Last year, a UN report identified the key drivers of biodiversity loss, including overfishing, climate change and pollution. But the single biggest driver of biodiversity loss is the destruction of natural habitats. Seventy-five per cent of Earth's land surface (where not covered by ice) has been changed by humans, much of it for agriculture, and as consumers we may unwittingly be contributing towards the loss of species through what we buy in the supermarket.
Our destructive relationship with the natural world isn’t just putting the ecosystems that we rely on at risk. Human activities like the trade in animals and the destruction of habitats drive the emergence of diseases. Disease ecologists believe that if we continue on this pathway, this year’s pandemic will not be a one-off event.
“We are at a turning point. What happens next is up to every one of us.”#ExtinctionTheFacts. Sunday 13 September. 8pm. @BBCOne & @BBCiPlayer. pic.twitter.com/YBGTeJG0Z0— BBC (@BBC) September 11, 2020
Geographers have been warning of many of these things for decades of course, but the message is slow to prompt individual change, and the systems in place make that difficult. Plus, the larger scale activities of countries to continue developing fossil fuels and not protect important habitats. The link between our exploitation of wild animals and the emergence of pandemics has already been explored as well.
More details of the programme from the iPlayer page where it can be viewed.
Extinction is now happening up to 100 times faster than the natural evolutionary rate, but the issue is about more than the loss of individual species. Everything in the natural world is connected in networks that support the whole of life on earth, including us, and we are losing many of the benefits that nature provides to us. The loss of insects is threatening the pollination of crops, while the loss of biodiversity in the soil also threatens plants growth. Plants underpin many of the things that we need, and yet one in four is now threatened with extinction.
Last year, a UN report identified the key drivers of biodiversity loss, including overfishing, climate change and pollution. But the single biggest driver of biodiversity loss is the destruction of natural habitats. Seventy-five per cent of Earth's land surface (where not covered by ice) has been changed by humans, much of it for agriculture, and as consumers we may unwittingly be contributing towards the loss of species through what we buy in the supermarket.
Our destructive relationship with the natural world isn’t just putting the ecosystems that we rely on at risk. Human activities like the trade in animals and the destruction of habitats drive the emergence of diseases. Disease ecologists believe that if we continue on this pathway, this year’s pandemic will not be a one-off event.
I decided to watch two old men fishing for trout instead, but will catch up this week...
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